Led on by Anne Perry’s latest Christmas novelette, which was a lot less verbiose and repetitive and just plain silly about clues and procedures than the previous one, I did read “A Christmas Hope.” Then, because I have always liked her main series characters, particularly the women, Charlotte Pitt and Hester now-Monk, I decided to try the latest in both series. But whatever her women’s virtues, after over 50 novels in the same setting, Perry is just about down to boilerplate paragraphs. If a character steps out in the street, a carriage with women in it will come past, jingling and jangling. Elsewhere, there will be street criers and/or noises that always include a distant hurdy-gurdy or barrel organ. In this novel cd. practically write these paragraphs myself.The main reasons for abandoning Perry, though, are firstly, the utter cluelessness of the detectives, whose flapping round like a chicken with one foot nailed down has reached plague proportions. Three quarters of this novel is Pitt running round to interviews asking the same questions to which everyone he approaches gives him the same pointless answers. Each time the reader cd. already supply such, and in each case, the story fails to advance in any way at all. Then, as usual,enormous breakthroughs suddenly occur in the last ten pages, and the whole thing ends without any real summing up or closure, leaving this reader, at least, far too far up in the air. I put up with this structural pattern for about the last twenty novels, but now I'm over it. Second reason for abandoning Perry's protagonists, however loveable. After whatever number of books this is, I wd. like something ever so slightly *different.* This 28th episode in Anne Perry's Charlotte and Thomas Pitt series deals with the topic of rape, a crime that was rarely talked about in Victorian times.Thomas is now Head of Special Branch and as such is required to attend diplomatic events where Charlotte can once again mix with society. They are attending such a function when they hear the news that an investor's wife, Catherine Quixwood has been assaulted and found dead in her home of a suspected overdose. At the same party they witness Angeles Castelbranco, the young daughter of the Portuguese ambassador shrink away in fear from a young man who is taunting her. Some time later at another event she runs from this young man and falls through a plate glass window to her death.Both women have been raped and as neither is alive can't name the men who assaulted them. In Victorian times a young girl's family would not accuse a man of rape, particularly if he was from a 'good family' in order to protect her reputation and not spoil her chances of marriage. When the man who raped Angeles strikes again the victim's family keep quiet and refuse to involve police.However, the Pitts daughter, Jemima is only 2 years younger than Angeles and both Thomas and Catherine feel the injustice of the rapist getting away with his crimes. At the same time, a young financier who had secret meetings with Catherine in order to give her financial advice has been charged with her rape and murder and looks set to hang unless Thomas and Victor Narraway, the former Head of the secret service can find evidence of who really murdered Catherine.This novel started off with two nasty crimes and ended with a suspenseful courtroom scene but the middle felt somewhat flat. Partly because Charlotte, her sister Emily and Aunt Vespasia did not feature as much as usual in the sleuthing and ferreting out of clues. Aunt Vespasia's dry wit and wry comments alone are worth reading the books for and there were few of those in this novel. The issue of rape and the difficulty of convicting anyone in Victorian times was a major theme and one that was repeatedly discussed more than necessary to get the message through. The ending felt somewhat rushed with all the pieces falling into place very quickly, whereas the plot may have been made more interesting if they had started to be revealed a little earlier in the book.
What do You think about Midnight At Marble Arch (2013)?
More a a Narraway mystery, but William & Charlotte are there too.
—LadyTristan
Recommended by Greece Public Library (Rochester, NY).
—hannahbaby33
